Marie Krebs Piano-forte Recital: 7th

“Mlle. Marie Krebs, in her répertoire and in her versatility of style, seems to be inexhaustible, and it was gratifying to find yesterday that the public begin to patronize as well as appreciate her interesting piano recitals. The smaller hall of Messrs. Steinway was filled yesterday afternoon with an attentive audience. Miss Krebs played the following works [see above]. She is a hard-working, conscientious and earnest artist, and her playing yesterday gave unbounded satisfaction. There are few pianists in America who can boast of such a repertoire, and her execution is marvellous. She was assisted by Mrs. Gulager and Signor Randolfi, with Mr. Dachauer as accompanist.”

Review: New York Post, 27 February 1871, 2.

“There is a stability about the Krebs matinees that is characteristic of none other of our Saturday musical entertainments. The seventh took place day before yesterday, and the series will be continued. People are finding out that despite rival attractions elsewhere Miss Krebs is always at her post at Steinway’s on Saturday afternoons.

Of late too, she has given a lighter and more popular character to her programmes. On Saturday, besides Bach and other classical composers, she conceded to the average taste Thalberg’s ‘Home’ and the delicious ‘Masaniello’ Tarantella, as arranged by Liszt. Her performance of all was admirable.

Miss Krebs was assisted by Mrs. Gulager, whose sweet voice is becoming a marked attraction in the concert room, and who sang charmingly several Italian selections, Millard’s fine song ‘Waiting,’ and a graceful ballad—‘The White Dove’—by Virginia Gabriel. Mr. Randolfi also lent his aid, and was well received.”

Review: New-York Times, 27 February 1871, 5.

“Miss Krebs is a young artist of taste and culture, and she is as industrious as she is ambitious. The selections she plays indicate that she has no lack of the quality that o’erleaps itself, although we do not mention the quotation in assertion of a doubt as to the good results of any well-pondered attempt. Quite unlike half a dozen older pianists whom we could name, Miss Krebs draws from an inexhaustible repertory. She executes all music with intelligence, dexterity, and with a purity of style appreciable in pieces trivial and grand. On the other hand, she rarely reaches even relative perfection. Polyglots are generally untrustworthy as linguists, and few pianists can interpret, in their most representative works, Bach and Chopin, Thalberg and Liszt. Miss Krebs gave a delicious reading of Mendelssohn’s ‘Rondo Capricciosa,’ a most satisfying delivery of Bach’s ‘Italian Concert, and a brilliant exposition of the intricate and unending transcription, by Liszt, of the tarantella from ‘Masaniello,’ which is an exceedingly characteristic motive, but which becomes, by force of repetition, rather trying to the nerves. As we have repeated time and again, we cannot regard Miss Krebs as adequate to the appreciation of Chopin, or to the setting forth of so light and truthful a specimen of his production as the waltz she rendered badly. Thanks are due the lady for exhuming the ‘Tambourin—Rigaudon—Double,’ by Rameau. It shows a curious relic of the past— Rameau flourished in the seventeenth century—and if more unearthing of the kind were done there would be fewer laudatores temporis acti, and a wider faith in the future. Besides the numbers alluded to above Miss Krebs recited a study by Chopin, and Thalberg’s ‘Home, Sweet Home.’ Mrs. Philip D. Gulager and Mr. Randolfi lent vocal aid to the entertainment. These artists sang the duet from ‘La Traviata,’ ‘Pura Siccome un Angelo.’ Mr. Randolfi’s solos were Proch’s ‘Gloeckentone’ and Schubert’s ‘Serenade,’ the singer’s grand voice telling immensely in the two compositions. Mrs. Gulager sang with much sweetness Millard’s ‘Waiting,’ and a demand for a repeat secured a hearing of a pretty composition of Virginia Gabriel. The conductor was Mr. L. Dachauer.”

Review: New-York Daily Tribune, 27 February 1871, 5.

“The seventh of the matinée recitals of piano-forte music by Miss Mary Krebs presented us with the following programme: [see above].

This made a pleasantly varied entertainment. The two vocalists are well known and widely admired, and many of the audience were deeply interested in their performance. Miss Krebs herself has lately relaxed somewhat of the stern severity of her classical taste, and intermingled with her selections a few concessions to the pomps and vanities of the miscellaneous public. And yet no one, looking at such a programme as that of last Saturday, need fear that she will do much to weaken the interest which has been aroused in the higher musical circles by these extraordinary concerts. Since Prof. Ritter gave his short series of Historical Recitals, we have had no such uncovering of the dusty and half- forgotten treasures of the past, no such revelations of the works of the old masters who to most of us are little more than respectable names. Bach’s ‘Concert in the Italian Style’ is a Suite which our pianists generally avoid, for two good reasons. The second movement, except under the most competent hands, is strangely dry and formal; the third and last is a terrible presto demanding the perfection of technique. We all know that Miss Krebs has the necessary qualifications, and we have had abundant proof of her sympathy with this giant of composers. She played the whole piece well, gave it the fresh spirit and beautiful expression which belongs to it, and rendered the last movement especially in her very best vein. Still more interesting, because more novel, than this, was the specimen from Jean Philippe Rameau, one of the greatest of the great lights of the old French school of harpsichord writing. The music of France has certainly got far enough away from his patterns in the hundred and fifty years since he flourished, and there is question now, even among respectable authorities, whether Rameau was a genius or merely a periwig-pated trifler. There is no doubt some formalism in his writings—as in those of many greater men, too—but he had a rare gift of graceful and cheerful melody, while of his eminence as a contrapuntist there has never been any question. The composition which Miss Krebs selected on a Saturday consists of two lively dance-measures, a tambourin and a rigadon, which (to use the language of the old musicians) are ‘doubled,’ that is to say, repeated with variations. Suggestive though they may be of brocade and hair powder, ceremonious figures and elaborate paces, they are good, solid, carefully wrought music; and when they are played as they were on Saturday no true connoisseur can listen to them without delight. Rameau and Bach are the two composers with whom Miss Krebs made the most vivid impression at this concert, though we must not omit to compliment her upon the Mendelssohn Rondo and the hackneyed Thalberg variations.”